Lando Norris talks about his 2022 F1 season so far where he reckons he has done well where he adds about work to be done on McLaren side.
For McLaren, their first half of the 2022 campaign could be deemed as good but could have been better. An embarrassing start at Bahrain with 14th and 15th place. Since then they have improved greatly and have been a consistent points finisher predominantly by Norris as Daniel Ricciardo has had a disappointing campaign thus far.
Norris has a very good start to his 2022 campaign, scoring points in 10 out of the 13 races so far. And while he says they are many “highlights” from his season, one moment in particular stands out. The McLaren driver, who heads into the summer break on 76 points and seventh in the drivers’ championship, perhaps unsurprisingly picked out his stunning podium finish at Imola as his best race of the year so far.
McLaren still have a lot to do but Norris has been in the top ten on ten occasions so far so it has been good, not as good as 2021 perhaps. “For myself and my driving and so on, I’m happy,” said Norris. “Some good highlights, I don’t know how I got a podium in Imola, it just blows my mind. With the car that we have that’s quite some achievement so still makes me smile now, but then there are still a lot of positives.”
Currently, fifth in the constructors’ race, McLaren are just four points behind Alpine in that battle. Last season they fought with Ferrari for third overall throughout the campaign. From now on until the flag drops in Abu Dhabi, they will still be a busy team.
“It’s just now we have a lot of work to do,” said Norris. “The gap to the guys ahead is still massive and I guess yes, it’s close on Saturday, but everyone is closer on Saturday, even last place is a lot closer. It’s just the spread on Sunday is bigger than what it has been in past, and we’ve got to work on that”.
“I’ll enjoy my break first and then we will work on it and see what we can do for next time. I think reasonable start to the season, so I’m happy with it,” summed up Norris. After the Bahrain disaster, the team have pulled their socks up and overall have made great strides in the campaign.
“Our consistency, reliability in many ways, pit stops, strategy, a lot of things have been very strong,” said Norris. “Just we didn’t start as well as what we wanted but I think we’ve made some good progress since then, so as long as we continue to do that after the break then I’ll be happy.
“But it’s just been tough you know – you always want to fight for more and fight for higher positions and the gap we have to the top three teams is still a big one, so we just need to focus on closing that down,” summed up Norris.
It has been tough as the leading three teams are massively ahead of the rest. The battle between McLaren and Alpine should really be one to savour from Belgium onwards. McLaren still have hunger and desire to achieve more, a top three in the Constructors in 2022 may be out of reach but it won’t be for lack of trying.
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